“Saving the planet is now a communications issue,” said David Attenborough, one of the world’s most admired writers and presenters of spectacular and moving nature documentaries back in 2020.

And the IPCC, dubbed the world climate council, agrees in its 2023 AR6 Synthesis Report: "Key barriers to adaptation are limited resources, lack of private sector and citizen engagement, insufficient mobilization of finance (including for research), low climate literacy, lack of political commitment, limited research and/or slow and low uptake of adaptation science, and low sense of urgency."

Public Relations, and thus practitioners around the world, have a key role to play in tackling the climate crisis. Especially now, as other topics top many agendas even though we increasingly experience the negative effects of the climate crisis around the world. We need to talk climate more than ever.

IPRA furthers ethical climate change communication

Which is why IPRA, the leading global network for PR professionals in their personal capacity, created the Climate Change Chapter in 2021, coinciding with the United Nations’ 26th climate change Conference of the Parties (COP26). Since then, the international working group is contributing to making climate change and related good practice communications a topic among the global PR community – based on our ethical values and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

Indeed, our 2023 Climate Change Communications Guidelines explicitly refer to SDG 13, urging action to combat climate change and its impacts, and for communicators to assume their responsibility. Outlining ethical principles, these guidelines have since made their way into national PR associations worldwide and provide a basis for discussion and orientation for practitioners around the world.

In 2022, to showcase exemplary communications around climate change, we added a new entry category to the IPRA Golden World Awards – the only truly global award scheme with entries from all inhabited continents. Expanded to also highlight ESG-related work this year, this category recognizes great work addressing climate change or environmental, social, and corporate governance topics. Giving the best campaigns a platform in our webinars, we want to help inspire the global PR community.

Which trends do we see in the three years since we introduced the new category? A look at three generations of successful GWA entries reveals the topics, approaches, and current developments.

Three years of the GWA Climate Change category

The entries we receive cover a wide range of geographies. In 2022, our five finalists in the climate change category came from Hungary, Poland, Spain, South Africa, and Turkey. LLYC addressed the issue of climate anxiety on behalf of BKK through an installation of a larger-than-life sculpture of a drowning girl’s head. BCW Africa helped the Cartoon Network highlight their educational and empowering campaign to increase climate change awareness among kids. SliceBrand used climate-related storytelling to generate attention for a food waste reduction technology from Wasteless. FüstMentes worked for Philip Morris to make people understand their emissions footprint and reduce it in small daily actions. Nestle leveraged the topic of food waste to draw attention to their environmental initiatives.

A year later, in 2023, we again saw a wide range of geographies with the finalists coming from Hungary, Philippines, Spain and Turkey. Nogochi supported Upfield Hungary to educate about the environmental impact of daily food choices, pitching a margarine brand against butter regarding emissions. LLYC, in another memorable campaign for BKK, set-up a huge balloon inside a glass box which was brought to explosion due to the wrong sustainability choices made by passers-by. Fashion brand Boyner partnered with National Geographic, documenting wild animals to highlight biodiversity. NutriAsia tapped into Filipino culture to counter plastic waste through refilling stores. And the Hungarian Beekeepers association brought bees to life in a 360° campaign for children including a large exhibition at the National Museum.

In 2024, outstanding campaigns from Croatia, Hungary, the Netherlands and Turkey made it into the GWA finals. Sobraz supported Unilever brand OMO to increase awareness of recycling by turning plastic waste into kids’ playgrounds. HvdM Public Relations worked with ASB Bank to maximize visibility of the bank’s sustainable voting guide for the Dutch elections. 404 agency helped Terra Hub Croatia to educate citizens about climate change with a climate dictionary and visualizing climate change effects through a student art exhibition. Lounge Group strengthened reputation for MVM Group with an engaging sustainability talk show and online series, preceded by experiential guerilla PR. Lastly, Hayat Holding partnered with ministries and a university to educate students about climate change.

More science, more education, more cooperation

Looking at the climate change finalists, it is evident that success is not a matter of big budget, nor the realm of big brands or just a handful of countries. Great climate change communication is possible with every amount of money, and the 2022-24 finalists came from around the globe.

Every year, there was at least one campaign that stunned us by its sheer creativity and outstandingly effective core idea. And that still makes for the best campaigns: Great ideas, implemented well.

Visibility and achieving relevant reach are a hygiene factor. However, the most successful campaigns go way beyond simple media coverage. And while some campaigns still leverage sustainability values for marketing and are part of reputation-enhancing CSR projects, we see a trend towards aiming for real impact – be it reducing food waste, plastic, or making climate-friendly decisions in our everyday lives.

Indeed, we often notice a more educational and interactive focus, living up to the responsibility of PR professionals as outlined by David Attenborough and addressing some of the barriers to effective climate action. A strong experiential element such as social experiments, mind-blowing sculptures or PR stunts engage audiences effectively. At the same time, we see more impact measures in the evaluation.

What we are also seeing is that more and more businesses acknowledge the role of science, basing their campaigns on recognized insights such as the planetary boundaries and research from the UN’s IPCC. The best campaigns seek relevant partnerships in politics, society and academia for added strength.

The future of great climate change campaigns will focus even more on stakeholder empowerment and increasingly aim for a positive impact beyond reputation and consumers, aligned with the core business.